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good, virtuous, contented, and obedient, and to be guarded
from the sins and vices of Oliver Twist: whom the supplica-
tion distinctly set forth to be under the exclusive patronage
and protection of the powers of wickedness, and an article
direct from the manufactory of the very Devil himself.
It chanced one morning, while Oliver’s affairs were in
this auspicious and confortable state, that Mr. Gamfield,
chimney-sweep, went his way down the High Street, deeply
cogitating in his mind his ways and means of paying cer-
tain arrears of rent, for which his landlord had become
rather pressing. Mr. Gamfield’s most sanguine estimate of
his finances could not raise them within full five pounds of
the desired amount; and, in a species of arthimetical des-
peration, he was alternately cudgelling his brains and his
donkey, when passing the workhouse, his eyes encountered
the bill on the gate.
‘Wo—o!’ said Mr. Gamfield to the donkey.
The donkey was in a state of profound abstraction: won-
dering, probably, whether he was destined to be regaled
with a cabbage-stalk or two when he had disposed of the
two sacks of soot with which the little cart was laden; so,
without noticing the word of command, he jogged onward.
Mr. Gamfield growled a fierce imprecation on the donkey
generally, but more particularly on his eyes; and, running
after him, bestowed a blow on his head, which would inevi-
tably have beaten in any skull but a donkey’s. Then, catching
hold of the bridle, he gave his jaw a sharp wrench, by way
of gentle reminder that he was not his own master; and by
these means turned him round. He then gave him another

Oliver Twist